Garcia et al. (2009) in their paper "Bioreactor scale-up and oxygen transfer rate in microbial processes:an overview" explained an anomaly in their data in the experiments to measure the oxygen uptake rate (OUR) of microbial cells using the gas-in gas-out method. There was a 50% difference between the steady-state and the un-steady state method. Garcia tried to explain this by the "cellular economy principle, where it was attributed that during the shutting off of the gas supply, microbial cells consume oxygen at a lower rate. Is this possible?